Pauline Likes The Rites Of Spring

I've said it before but it's always worth repeating: I have some fantastic friends - and one of my best pals is the always-sweet Pauline, who just sent me this great review of my new serial story: The Rites of Spring. Thanks again, Pauline!

Is it the future? Is it a parallel world? Is it NOW; a secret tribal world, existing around us? A world; a culture that is there, but which we don't see? M.Christian doesn't tell us, in this first chapter of his serialized novel; RITES OF SPRING. Perhaps he won't tell us. He may leave us to work it out for ourselves; choose the framework we like best.

Gazelle runs. It is what she exists for in this competitive culture. She will achieve the status of 'Messenger', when she has completed her run. Gazelle is proud. Her only purpose is to be the fastest; the best. She pushes herself through the pain barrier; the wall. Her run through the hard city streets, jolts and tortures every muscle in her aching body. Her run is musical, spiritual. Each bead of sweat chimes into a chorus of ecstacy. She's high on the endorphins rushing through her, from her dreadlocked hair, to her tortured feet. The glaring sun beats down on her aching body. The run is both final test, and trophy. The ultimate prize for all her years of training.

M.Christian's opening chapter of RITES OF SPRING, is written with lyrical style, panache, flair. Christian is a natural storyteller. He keeps us turning the page; always wanting to know, 'what happens next.' His use of language is rich and exotic and always a joy to a reader. Perhaps Gazelle's world is a metaphor for our own competitive world, where winning is everything; perhaps not. But I want to know; I want to find out. And that, along with great writing, from an accomplished writer, is what will keep me hanging on for Chapter two.

Where Licked? What Promises?

A few folks have been asking what stories are in my brand spanking new collection, Licks & Promises, so here (ta-da!) is the TOC:

Introduction By Sage Vivant
The Train They Call the City of New Orleans
Dead Letter
Dust
The House of the Rising Sun
In Control
Kiss, Kiss, Hug, Hug
Mile After Mile
The Naked Supper
Nighthawks
Regrets
The Tinkling of Tiny Silver Bells
Water of Life
The Will of Dr. Mabuse
The Waters of Biscayne Bay
The World Game
One After Another
Her First Thursday Evening

A Mammothly Painted Doll

This is very cool news: the first chapter of my novel, Painted Doll, was just accepted by Maxim Jakubowksi for his Mammoth Book of New Erotica, Vol. 9. Thanks, Maxim!

Steve Williams Loves Dirty Words

This is very cool news: Steve Williams has just posted a great review of Dirty Words for Suite 101. Here's a taste - click here for the rest.


Steve Williams for Suite 101:

M. Christian, the celebrated author of novels like Painted Doll and Brushes, is widely regarded as being at the forefront of erotic fiction, whether writing for the gay, straight or transgender market, and his anthology Dirty Words yet again pushes boundaries in a collection of eclectic and satisfactorily disturbing stories.

Dirty Words proves that M. Christian's prodigious imagination is just as formidable as ever, from stories of sex after death in Echoes, to tales of shamanic seduction in Coyote & The Less Than Perfect Cougar, and disturbing yarns like Wet that twist sex and murder into one dark act; there's something for everyone in Dirty Words, but be warned, for those who like straightforward eroticism, this is anything but.

Truly great is the fact that in as little as ten or so pages of Dirty Words, M. Christian can create a plethora of characters and make his audience care about each one of them, as he does so in Wet, a story of immortality as gifted by a horrific kiss, which manages to create a hot little morality tale with maximum sensuality. This is a truly authentic writer at work.

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Pat Califia on Dirty Words

Unfortunately, due to space limitations, Pat Califia's marvelous intro to the original Dirty Words had to be left on the cutting room floor of the new, Lethe Books, edition.

But here it is: a real treat from a great person and a fantastic writer:

Dirty Deeds For Dirty Boys (And Men)
By
Patrick Califia-Rice

It can be very damned awkward to have a good friend who is also a writer (or wants to be one). What do you do when someone approaches you for an introduction or a blurb for the back cover ... and you like their wicked smile or their spicy chicken marsala or their hospitable, fuzzy butt a whole lot more than you like their paragraphs, which are as graceful as a football tumbling down the stairs, mixed metaphors, and fuck scenes that could not be resurrected with a truckload of Viagra? Fortunately for me, M. Christian presents no such dilemma. Given our long and intimate acquaintance, I probably can’t be 100% objective about the book you are holding in your hot little hands. But I can honestly say that this is some of the best writing, period, that I’ve perused in the last year.

Be forewarned: Dirty Words is not a walk in the park on a sunny day. Like many quiet and unassuming people, M. Christian conceals a frightening intellect, a lurid imagination, and a Zen comprehension of the evil that men can do. In case you never have the privilege of meeting him or hearing him read, I’d like you to know that he’s a really nice guy. Honest. Sweet. Compassionate. But all of those virtues spring from doctoral-level study of the Shadow. His kindness is informed by a sad appraisal of all the self-interested alternatives. He chooses not to exploit others even though he gets exactly how thrilling it can be to push a weaker person down and suck them dry.

The best writing about sex is also about something else. The San Francisco writers I refer to as the Glamorous Nerd Pornographers are hand-crafting a renaissance of smart smut. Like Fanny Hill, My Secret Life, or Dangerous Liaisons (bet you didn’t know that was originally a very banned book), sexually-explicit work by Carol Queen, Thomas Roche, M. Christian, Bill Brent, Ian Philips, Kirk Read, and their fellow travelers creates a record of mores, manners, philosophy, fashion, controversy, politics, religion, and other keynotes that preserve the tenor of a given moment in human history. (As do a handful of great sex writers in other locales, like Tristan Taormino in, uh, what is that place, New York City?)

The themes that preoccupy M. Christian include (but are not restricted to) revenge (in “Chickenhawk” and “Counting” he details the way a pursuit of vengeance alters the agents of Nemesis as well as her object), the signifiers of masculinity (two badder-than-bad bikers in “The Harley” compete for possession of a dead bro’s hawg), the odd things that can cause one human being to bond with another (“What Ails You”), and the Crisco-slippery, razor-sharp twists that Fate loves to hand out to those who think they already know how their story is going to end (“Matches”). Oh, and cocksucking. I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a writer who is more poetically obsessed with cocksucking than M. Christian. He is a bard of deep-throat, a lyrical celebrator of the profoundly transformative act of blowing a load all over somebody else’s tonsils. He’s a dab hand at describing ass fucking as well. But there’s a difference between the three-star restaurant and the one that gets four stars. M. Christian has paid his dues, watching the habits of the feral, big dick (his own and others) as assiduously as your maiden aunt noted various species of swallows in her bird-watching log, or monitored the ownership of cars parked after dark in other people’s driveways.

There’s a lot of pretty violent stuff in this book (see “Blue Boy” for a prime example). But even the most horrific acts become as jubilant and aesthetically pleasing as a machine-gun massacre in a Quentin Tarantino film. And there’s always a surprise. M. Christian does not take the easy way out. From the relentless way he works his readers’ nerves, one might almost suspect him of a certain amount of sadism. He’s also a surprisingly moral authorónever preachy, but never slipping into the sort of gratuitous bloodshed that quickly becomes a big yawn. There’s no noir character more overworked than the vampire, but M. Christian puts a new spin on it with a melancholy artist who feels obligated to clean up the mistakes he makes when his loneliness becomes too much to bear (“Wet”).

The carefully choreographed pseudoviolence that’s called sadomasochism in the postindustrial West also figures heavily in these stories (“Spike” and “Puppy”). But these are not the hackneyed stories that make one fall asleep over most of the remaindered paperback product of Masquerade Books. “Spike” is a tour de force about narcissism that would make the most seasoned psychiatrist seek out his own psychoanalysis, and “Puppy” pokes good horny fun at every stereotype of the autocratic and omniscient Master.

It will no doubt become apparent to you before you’ve flipped very many of these pages, pumped the bottle of Sex Grease a few times, and dug out a clean (or at least cleaner) cum rag that M. Christian is a talented writer of horror as well as science fiction, mythology, and porn. This synthesis of horrorerotica reaches a peak, in this book, in “Echoes.” I’m not sure I wanted to know this much about necrophilia, but now that I do, it is probably building my character, even as I type this introduction.

But my favorite stories in Dirty Words feature that irrepressible trickster god who is probably the patron saint of queers. I am talking about Coyote himself, blood brother of Loki, Set, and Elegba. In “Coyote and the Less-than-Perfect Cougar” and “How Coyote Stole the Sun,” M. Christian perfectly captures the cringing and fawning facade of this master thief and Back Door Man. Coyote has his priorities straight. He’s not afraid to flatter the pants off you, as long as he gets those drawers down around your ankles.

You can shoot Coyote. You can poison him. You can trap him and hang him and throw him off the cliff or lock him up in jail, blow him up, starve him, and flatten him with a steamroller. But he’ll always pull himself together and be back tomorrow night or in a fortnight, making good use of the intelligence he gathered during his fatal foray at your defenses. Sooner or later he will walk off with your cherry, your cash, your car keys, your boyfriend’s virtue, and your most cherished illusions. When you’ve been [literally] fucked over by Coyote, you emerge a sadder but wiser person, and not really all that sore, considering that you’ve just been banged by the sacred phallus of the Father of Lies.

Coyote represents the persistence and survival of the downtrodden, the not-particularly-deserving poor. He is able to take joy in life even when the conditions around him are unbelievably bleak. He is ingenious, creative, fun-loving, and apparently irresistible. Coyote knows what’s behind propriety (and chances are, has been in that behind). He knows who is unfaithful, who sleeps with the stone of a guilty conscience in his bed, who harbors “unnatural” desires. To Coyote this is all grist for the mill. Because he is free of the normal prohibitions that regulate right-thinking mortals and gods, he always keeps his mobility. The most severe punishment cannot turn Coyote aside from his pursuit of carnal pleasure, comfort, and advantage over others. He teaches us to respect the aspects of ourselves that we would much rather disown. Because when we pretend to be obedient and righteous, all that repression and self-delusion distracts us from the here-and-now. We leave the chicken coop unlocked, and Coyote gets a free meal. Or we forget to satisfy our loved ones’ dirtiest impulses, and Coyote gets a quick and shabby but ecstatic fuck on your clean sheets.

That brings us back to where we started, with some high-faluting talk about the Shadow. Jungian psychologists believe that when we are most cut off from these disavowed and dangerous emotions and actions, we become depressed, impotent, and unable to do any real good. We may be frightened or disgusted by the faces of the bastard children of our own spirits, but they are often the most energetic, vivid, and real parts of ourselves. Pornography exists to keep the Shadow of a monotheistic and ransacked world alive. As long as one person can write about or film ribald acts that flaunt the status quo, and somebody else can read or watch this heresy and beat off hard enough to take off like a helicopter, magic will be kept alive, and along with it our best hope of salvation. (Which we achieve, paradoxically enough, only when we abandon the gloss of being pure or holy.)

Pornographers are thus the fitting heirs of the trickster archetype. It’s no surprise that this genre of entertainment is banned as often for its political satire, attacks on the church, or lampooning of other sacred cows as it is for being too plainspoken about the Old In and Out. In Dirty Words, M. Christian has a prolonged romp at the expense of homophobia, several flavors of People of the Book, butch iconography, pacifism, pulling out before you cum, selfishness, prudery, bullying, virginity, and monogamy. Put your ear closer to this page and you will hear an outraged mooing. Then go get your reading glasses and your poppers or whatever accessories you require to luxuriate in a good dirty book, and savor, relish, enjoy, get it up and get it off, and laugh yourself sick and sane.

The Amazing Sage Vivant

It's no secret that I think that Sage Vivant is the bee's knees: for the marvelously caring person she is, definitely; for her magical smile, absolutely; for her sparkling mind, certainly.

But even more for the fact that she is a truly amazing writer.

So it's a real treat that the fun folks at Logical-Lust have just released two fantastic stories by Sage: The Yacht, and Chemistry.

Here's a sweet taste from Chemistry.

Enjoy!

Chemistry
By
Sage Vivant

The paddle came down for a third time on his already stinging bottom. He was so hard and the pain was so sublime, tears welled up in his eyes.

“Unbelievable impudence!” Claire Chutney announced as punctuation to her third wallop.

“What kind of home do you come from, young man, that condones that kind of activity?”

Her lap was sturdy. With legs as long as hers—she was well over six feet tall—he didn’t doubt for a moment that she could support him indefinitely. And if she could support him indefinitely, how long might she spank him?

He heard a quiet thud on the carpet. Through his tears, he saw the paddle now lying on the vanilla-colored carpet. His heart felt swollen and lodged in his esophagus. She couldn’t be finished rendering her punishment yet! He needed more, deserved more, craved more...

And then her palm met with his unprotected behind. The slapping noise seemed to come several seconds before the delicious meeting of her skin against his. His ears perked up at the very sound of it, and then the heat spread out in concentric circles from the point of impact—to his thigh, his hip, the small of his back. His tears now rolled down one side of his face, which he didn’t think she could see.

“Oh yes, go ahead and cry. It won’t do you a lick of good. The damage has been done! You’re lucky you aren’t going to jail for your offense!”

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Zander Vyne Likes Licks & Promiese

Here's a great -- and very touching -- review of my new erotic collection, Licks & Promises, from the wonderful Zander Vyne. Thanks, Zander!

Sometimes a book lands in your hands like a gift, one that keeps you up all night reading, sighing with both contentment and sadness when it’s over.

M. Christian’s newest short fiction collection, Licks And Promises, is like that. A master of erotica writing, he certainly doesn’t need another glowing review of his work, but I am going to give him one anyway—that’s how good these stories are. There is something for everyone represented here.

Dust explores regret, in only seven pages, with a depth that some novelists would need a whole book to accomplish. The richly drawn inner landscape of the main character, combined with the realness of her emotions is breathtaking. Yes, he works in a hot sex scene, but somehow that’s OK. Who hasn’t fucked someone in order to heal themselves, and apologize for something you cannot, or will not, talk about?

The Train They Call The City of New Orleans is as dripping with character as its namesake. The woman in the story is only along for the ride, and what a ride it is. The language is stunning and poetic.

In Control comes off like a kinky little fetish piece and hits that mark with precision, but underlying it is M. Christians quirky sense of humor, and knack for shining a bright light on what’s truly making these people tick. He has the balls to slyly ask what I’ve always wanted to about D/s, but does so with no judgment, no attitude. He leaves recognition of the question, and the answer, up to his reader.

The Naked Supper is pure food porn—a buffet of poetic erotica and self-love, just not in the way you might expect. Nothing M. Christian writes is predictable.

Nighthawks could be a story about the painting of the same name, but to me it was a story of missed chances, people who pass in the night. I like that about his work too—like good art, the reader often can interpret it in a way that resonates with them. It’s almost like having a writer create something just for you.

Regrets is laugh-out-loud funny.

The Waters of Biscayne Bay will tug at your heart and make you want to hug the one you love the most.

Lick And Promises has eighteen stories and each shows why M. Christian really is a master on top of his craft. Yes, he writes about sex, but these are real people, with real problems, and real feelings. They are not picture-perfect, porno people getting it on to make us horny (though you will be turned on, I promise).

If you want to read about more than body parts hooking up, and are interested in finding out just what got all these people fucking in the first place (because we all know that what’s lurking inside of us is just as important as all the action going on outside) this is the book for you.

Pornotopia: Go Fuck Yourself

The following is just one of a bunch of pieces I’ve been working on for a project tentatively titled Pornotopia: The Ins and Outs and Ins and Outs of Sex and Erotica. Enjoy!


Maybe I'm weird ... okay, I KNOW I'm weird -- but, come on, I'm not THAT
Weird. I just can't suss it, can't comprehend it, can't wrap my five or so pounds of wrinkled gray matter around the idea that keeps cropping up in my writerly life these days: the notion that masturbation ain't okay.

Part of my writing life used to be answering questions from people about sex. I answered questions for quite a few sites, and before that, I was before that I was part of San Francisco Sex Information (415-989-SFSI or www.sfsi.org), a fabulous group of people that answer sexuality questions from anyone, anytime.

People have a lot of questions, it seems. There are lots of issues and discomforts: am I too small, too big, weird, 'normal', gay, a virgin...? But the one that really makes me scratch my head, and sometimes even frightens me is this one, asked in a zillion different ways: "Is is okay to masturbate?"

I know that people have issues. I have quite a few myself, but honestly, you're worried about masturbation? Maybe I shouldn't be writing about this; I feel like a blind man trying to understand color just trying to wrap my mind around how it could be a serious question -- or maybe I'm Van Gogh trying to describe a sunset to Ray Charles.

"I want to masturbate but every time I do I feel like I'm gay or something. All my friends make jokes about it and say how disgusting and gay masturbating is and that they'd never do it. I go along with there jokes but I never make any myself. Should I listen to my friends? Is masturbation something that only gay people do?" writes one kid, looking for answers.

Where does this come from, this fear, hatred, and homophobia? Are people like this so scared of their bodies that they resort to hysterical fear? It's easy to try and look around at bad parents, bad religion, hypocrisy, and so on. It's easy to try and dig for some kind of blame: we're a blame-based culture, we cling to illusions of cause and effect all the time.

But there's something here that really bothers me more than whatever it is that we might consider attributing this fear of masturbation to, something that I think is more important. Something that bothers me even more than the homophobia in the remarks I quoted above.

You see, the nature of this fear and hatred of masturbation -- it's more than a fear of sex, it's more than the terror of brimstone and demons. There's something frightening there, something a lot more base, a lot more fundimental. It's not really a cause, I think, but rather a symptom of something more sad and frightening. I see it in another comment by another letter writer, who writes "Why do people masterbate? I mean, masterbating is so sick."

What it is is a fear of what masturbation is all about. Think about it. What, after all, is the nature of masturbation? Autoerotic stimulation is the usual sex-ed buzz phrase, but there's something to it that goes beyond just stroking your happy bits 'til you lose control of a good percentage of your voluntary nervous system. Cousin-fucking ignorants call it 'sex-abuse.' 'Spilling seed' is the pet phrase of the Bible-thumpers. But what is masturbation, really, at its core?

Self-love.

Why do so many people feel bad about loving themselves? Why is it that they hold their genitals in their hand and feel shame and self-loathing? Why is it an insult to say "Go fuck yourself"? Why is "quit jerking me off" an expression of displeased annoyance? I've sought answers, but I'm still not sure. Perhaps it's a symptom of a deeper underlying malaise, a spiritual canker sore that flares up whenever we treat ourselves too well. Heaven knows that if we jerk off too much, we'll probably never leave the house... Civilization as we know it would come to a screeching halt. Gotta make sure we make it shameful.

Well, I've got news for ya, folks: I jerk off. As I've written: "Like it, love it, do it a lot." It's wonderful, it's glorious, it's a cheap night out. It's not "rather than sex", but rather a different kind of sex -- sometimes when I jerk off I wish for a partner, but other times when I'm with someone I'd much rather jerk off. There's no pressure to perform, there's no concern about the "You want me to do what?" syndrome. It's relaxing, stimulating, and fun .... I just wish the damned byproduct being a boy) wasn't so sticky and hard to get out of sheets. Small price to pay I guess.

I want to start a movement, a self-love movement. Yes, masturbation should be taught -- not technique (because that's something we all need to do for ourselves) but that the only real problem with it is cleaning up afterwards (you lucky girls). You won't go mad, grow hair on ypour palms, go to hell, become gay, run out of sperm, or any other hysterical fear. The worst that can happen is that you might give yourself Indian burn (use some lube, people, can't stress that enough!), and the best that can happen? Well, many people agree with me that it's a good thing to feel mind-blowing joy and loose control of major voluntary nervous responses. It's a very good thing. It's pleasurable, it's self-love: it's being able to be good to yourself, to give yourself joy.

That's it, more than the stroking, the vibrators, the butt-plugs, the porno -- it's getting down there with your own body, to touch yourself and give yourself what we depend too much on other people for: to make us feel good. Don't you deserve to feel loved, desirable, and happy? That's what jerking off is, that's what the nature of masturbation is: making love to yourself.

Love yourself. Aren't you worth it?

Thanks, Donna!

I'm very touched and very flattered that my pal, and an incredible writer, Donna George Storey, just posted a very cool comment and link to my ... and nothing but the ... post on her great Sex, Food and Writing site. Thanks, Donna!

The Truth About Writing--and It's All True!

I keep forgetting that much of the world regards writing as a glamorous profession. When I mention I'm a writer--something I've only felt comfortable doing in the past few years with the publication of my novel--eyes light up with interest. More often than not, a confession soon follows about a book my new acquaintance has been thinking of writing for a long time. Usually something along the lines of The Da Vinci Codebut with a new twist of some sort, but to be fair, the ideas run the gamut from thriller to Jane Austen literary (and they also usually sound like pretty good stories!). "Wonderful," I say. "Do it. You know, writing really changed my life. It made me see the world in a whole new way. So enriching!"

It's all true, but I don't have the heart to tell them that's only a small part of it. However, the multi-talented veteran erotica writer M. Christiandoes have the courage to spell it out for us. And what he says is so verytrue indeed. Be sure to read through to the end, fellow writers. You'll be glad you did!

OUT NOW: The Rites of Spring

What do you get when you cross weird science fiction, bawdy adventure, sideways humor, and delightful strangeness?

Frankly, I haven't the faintest idea, but my serial story, The Rites of Spring, might be pretty damned close.

So, if you like your science fiction weird, your adventure stories bawdy, your humor tilted, and your strangeness delightful then head on over to the great Paper Bag Press site and download the first chapter of my fun new project.

And, naturally, if you want to write a review then drop me a line and I'll send you over a copy.

Here's a quickie taste:

"Sweat, a runner’s thing and not a girlish thing, pooled in her valleys and streamed down her creases. Salt stung her eyes and her shoes. The miraculous devices were wet and heavy; liquid gently surged between her cramped toes. Some of Gazelle’s sweat cooled on the top of her head -- natural air-conditioning made from the run itself and her soaked dreadlocks.

Her belt jumped and wore at her hips, chiming and jingling, adding a sharp downward tug to each step. The tube, the reason for this whole thing, jumped and tapped her back with each step -- a high-pitched feeling compared to the trembling bass of the belt on her itching hips. Her kit, the bag, wasn’t heavy because there wasn’t much in it. But anything, no matter now slight, was an ache as she ran: Her breasts -- hills and valleys -- pulled against her chest; sandbags tied to her lungs and her back.

Despite the fuzzy wonderfulness of endorphins, everything hurt. Painful, sure, yes, damned straight -- but even it was a pain she was used to, trained for, bred for. It was a natural kind of pain, one that was intimate and close to most of her memories: she was a runner from a tribe of runners, and pain was something that was a part of doing anything -- because running was everything.

She was a Messenger: hours, hours, days, days she’d run the track around the ancient fort (from the Age of Slavery), the Runnerdrome. Mile after mile on the crunching and hissing gravel had made her friendly, intimate, bored with the long run. The burning of her lungs, the jumping with a kick of her strong, strong legs (miles and miles and miles on that track) put her over the wall, gave her the high medicine -- the reward of natural drugs.

Excitement, thrill was cinnamon in her mouth. This was her trip. Who cared if her breasts hurt? Who cared if her legs ached? This was her run, the prize. She wouldn’t turn back until she’d completed her task, and then, when she did return, she’d be a woman, a Messenger with merit.

Gazelle ran, absorbed in the action of her arms and her legs, blurred by the chant of her natural stride. She ran through the City, pumping and pounding, proud full to bursting -- after all, she’d won, she’d emerged victorious from the Rivalry. She’d passed all their tests (no matter how weird), she’d run their course (no matter how hard), and she’d emerged the winner and claimed the prize: the honor of the run, this run, her run.

One thing bothered her, though, cutting through the fog of endorphins, the glow of accomplishment, the blister that may or may not have been forming on her left heel:

Spoke had smiled, had wished her well.

... and nothing but the ...

Here's a 'fun' little piece I wrote to vent a bit about what it really means to be a writer ....

I’ve pretty much always wanted to be a writer but it’s only recently I’ve wanted to, well, be honest about what it really means to be a writer.

It’s not that the “How To” books, teachers, and especially writers really lied to me but after I finally stepped into the world of professional writing after ten long years of struggling I realized I had been unprepared for what it was really like.

After another ten years as a ‘pro’ I’ve come to realize some essential truths about being a writer, truths I wish I’d known before working all those years to get my work in print.

The first, and for some folks the biggest, reality check is that you’ll never be rich. In fact you’ll never be able to make a living – and even if you manage to do it for a while it won’t last very long. Insult to injury, it can even work against you getting a regular job: try explaining a six-month, or year-long, gap in your resume because you were trying to live as a writer. No employer wants to hire someone just biding their time until their dream comes true – especially if it never does.

The second is that you’ll never be famous: your book will never be an Oprah Book Club selection, you’ll never be interviewed on NPR, nothing you do will be made into a movie, you won’t be reviewed in the New Yorker, and people won’t ask for your autograph. You want fame? Then get on American Idol and sing … very, very badly. Even then you’ll only have your Andy Warhol fifteen minutes.

The third is that you’ll never get any respect. Friends won’t read your books, spouses will only read them because they have to, and if you tell anyone you’re a writer their eyes will glaze over for a minute and then they’ll ask you if you saw the latest reality show last night. You’ll get even less consideration from people in the ‘industry.’ if you can even get a reviewer to read your work, they're more likely to trash it than praise it because most are frustrated writers eager to show readers how "insightful" they are. Other writers will either arrogantly ignore you or speak ill of you or your work out of jealousy. Agents, publishers, and editors won’t answer your queries or if they do they’ll make it very clear that you’re not important to them – and never will be.

I’m not deaf. I can hear all of you very clearly: "But my last book made a bucket of money." "But I’ve got oodles of ‘friends’ on MySpace." "But my agent is wonderful!" … but … but … but … maybe you’re right, but you’re also completely wrong.

I’ve personally had some great experiences, some marvelous experiences, some fantastic experiences as a writer: decent royalty checks, fan letters from out of the blue, rave reviews, supportive friends, kind and conscientious editors, publishers, and agents, but they are rare exceptions. For every one of these positives there have been dozens, if not hundreds, of negatives.

But there’s another thing I wish I’d known before I set out to become a writer. It's something that, alas, I still work very hard to remember when one of those negatives crosses my desk or pops into my email box (or doesn’t, as the case may be). It’s something I wish I could tell every writer, and get everyone, everywhere, who deals with writers in any capacity, to understand as well.

Writers are brave.

Actually, that’s not quite right. Oh it’s accurate all right but it’s a little short of reality. It’s better to say writers are incredibly brave.

Every time we write we’re reaching back into our minds, our souls, our dreams, our fantasies to then throw what we craft out into an uncaring and cruel world. We do it all by ourselves, without help – or much help -- from anyone. We risk more with each story, each novel, than most people do in an entire lifetime and, what’s even more courageous is that we keep doing it, over and over, after each kick in the balls … or teeth, if you want to be less sexist.

We do it when the money doesn’t come, we do it when the fame doesn’t come, and we do it when the respect isn’t there. If that’s not bravery then I don’t know what is.

That’s the message I really wish I’d gotten when I was first starting out, that I now wish someone would tell all writers, budding or otherwise. Yes, I wish I could have told myself that being a writer would be a profitless, thankless, frustrating, demeaning, and depressing undertaking – but I also wish I could have heard that no matter what happens, or more than likely what doesn’t happen, I’d be doing something remarkably brave.

And that deserves tremendous respect and admiration -- even if it only comes from yourself.

Actually, again, that’s not quite right. It’s much more accurate to say especially if it comes from yourself.

Legendary Masquerade

This is very cool: Matt Schuler, the editor of Legendary, just posted a preview of the graphic story Wynn Ryder and I did, and that I've been chatting about here. When I get word about Legendary's publication date I'll naturally let you all know.

Year's Best Lesbian Fiction

Just got some very cool news: My story ("The One I Left Behind") from Catherine Lundoff's fantastic anthology, Haunted Hearths, just got picked up for Year's Best Lesbian Fiction.

If You Live In The UK -

(and I know some of you do) then check out the newest issue (Vol 43 No 6) of the very excellent Forum UK magazine for an sex-ed article by myself called "Happiness Is A Warm Bottom" (about the theory and practice of submission).

Here's a taste:

Invariably it happens. Sure, the workplace, the volunteer center, the family gathering, the "straight" friends, may not be the perfect place for my predilections to come to light but often they do. In my case, which I admit is rather unique, it's usually because I'm a writer of explicit materials (AKA "smut") and as such instantly become the expert in all things sexual -- but I also know some friends who just get tired of the inane jokes, the goggle-eyed mocking, the "would-you-believes" around things like body piercing and the "Dominatrix Love Triangles" on the Jerry Springer Show and just have to say something.

Once out, that's it: every stubbed toe, every sore back, every social interaction becomes shaded by their giggling discomfort. "But you like that kind of thing ("stubbed toe"), "Oh, and how did you -- wink, wink -- hurt it?" (sore back), "We know what Chris is going to do -- laugh -- this weekend. Just don't come back bruised."

They just can't get a grip on anyone who, in their eyes, likes to get hurt ....

[MORE]

Keep Your Eyes -

- on Flickr. I'm shooting to have some fun with a long-neglected hobby: photography. Hope you like!

Masquerade: Page 2

As I mentioned before, here's a preview of a very special project: Masquerade was illustrated by my great pal, and a fantastic artist, Wynn Ryder, from a story by ... well, me ... for an upcoming graphic novel anthology called Legendary.

I'll be putting up more pages from the final over the next few months ... or you can read the entire thing on Wynn's Deviantart pages.

Thanks!

As some of you may know things have been kind of tough for me lately. That's why I'm very touched by the folks who've reached out with their kindness and support. I can't believe I can actually say this, but there are too many to thank.

But I have to toss out some special hugs of gratitude to my beloved Jill; my cherished friend, Pauline; the fantastic Jude Mason; my sweet pal AF Waddell; the wonderful Lisabet Sarai; my friend Mick Dementiuk; Jim Brown; Donna George Storey; Oatmeal Girl, Remittance Girl, The Dirty Blond ... and others I'm ashamed to say have slipped my mind for the moment.

And I want to give a warm hug to a new friend, Don, who not only sent me a fantastic note but also some great presents from my amazon wish list!

For Don - and for all my other wonderful friends - here's a little smut story that I tried to also make into a statement about the great people in my life:

Love
By
M. Christian

"You could have stayed with me," he'd said, the first time I went to Seattle to see him, but stayed in a motel. I hadn't even thought of it, and so the disappointment in his eyes.

I never went back. After he got promoted there wasn't any point.

You could have stayed with me evolves into a fantasy in which those four days play out differently: an invitation made earlier, my discomfort of staying in someone else's house miraculously absent. Fresh off the plane, strap digging into my shoulder (I always overpack), out of the cab and up a quick twist of marble steps to his front door. A knock, or a buzz, and it opens.

A quick dance of mutual embarrassment as I maneuver in with my luggage, both of us saying the stupid things we all say when we arrive somewhere we've never been before. Him: "How was your flight?" Me: "What a great place."

Son of a decorator, I always furnish and accessorize my fantasies: I imagine his to be a simple one bedroom. Messy, but a good mess. A mind's room, full of toppling books, squares of bright white paper. Over the fireplace (cold, never lit) a print, something classical like a Greek torso, the fine line topography of Michangelo's David. A few pieces of plaster, three-dimensional anatomical bric-a-brack on the mantel. A cheap wooden table in the window, bistro candle, and Don't Fuck With The Queen in ornate script on a chipped coffee cup.

Dinner? No, my flight arrived late. Coffee? More comfortable and gets to the point quicker. We chat. I ask him about his life: is everything okay? He replies that he's busy, but otherwise fine. We chat some more. I say that it's a pleasure to work with him. He replies with the same.

I compliment him, amplifying what I've already said, and he blushes. He returns it, and then some, making me smile. My eyes start to burn, my vision blurs, tears threatening. I sniffle and stand up.

He does as well, and we hug. Hold there. Hold there. Hold there. Then, break—but still close together. Lips close together. The kiss happens. Light, just a grazing of lips. I can tell he wants more, but I'm uncomfortable and break it but not so uncomfortable that I can't kiss his cheeks. Right, then left, then right again.

But his head turns and we're kissing, lips to lips again. Does he open his first or do I? Sometimes I imagine his, sometimes mine. But they are open and we are kissing, lips and tongue, together. Hot, wet, hard.

But not on my part. Wet, definitely—in my mind it's a good kiss. A generous and loving kiss. Hot, absolutely, but only in a matter of degrees as his temperature rises and mine does in basic body response.

Not hard on my part, but I am aware of his. Between us, like a finger shoved through a hole in his pocket, something solid and muscular below his waist.

Does he say something? "I want you," "Please touch me," "I'm sorry," are candidates. I've tried them all out, one time or another, to add different flavors, essences, spices to that evening. "I want you," for basic primal sex. "Please touch me," for polite request, respect and sympathy. "I'm sorry," for wanting something he knows I don't.

"It's okay," I say to all of them, and it is. Not just words. Understanding, sympathy, generosity. All of them, glowing in my mind. It really is okay.

I'm a pornographer, dammit. I should be able to go on with the next part of this story without feeling like … I'm laughing right now, not that you can tell. An ironic chuckle: a pornographer unable to write about sex. Not that I can't write about myself, that making who I am—really—the center of the action is uncomfortable, because I've certainly done that before. I've exposed myself on the page so many other times, what makes this one so different?

Just do it. Put the words down and debate them later. After all, that's what we're here for, aren't we? You want to hear what I dream he and I do together. You want to look over my mental shoulder at two men in that tiny apartment in Seattle.

I'm a writer; it's what I do, and more importantly, what I am. So we sit on the couch, he in the corner me in the middle. His hand is on my leg. My back is tight, my thighs are corded. Doubt shades his face so I put my own hand on his own, equally tight, thigh. I repeat what I said before, meaning it: "It's okay."

We kiss again. A friend's kiss, a two people who like each other kiss. His hands touch my chest, feeling me through the thin cloth of turtleneck. I pull the fabric out of my pants with a few quick tugs, allowing bare hands to touch bare chest. He likes it, grinning up at me. I send my own grin, trying to relax.

His hand strokes me though my jeans, and eventually I do get hard. His smile becomes deeper, more sincere, lit by his excitement. It's one thing to say it, quite another for your body to say it. Flesh doesn't lie, and I might have when I gave permission. My cock getting hard, though, is obvious tissue and blood sincerity.

"That's nice," "Can I take it out?" "I hope you're alright with this." Basic primal sex, a polite request including respect and sympathy, and the words for wanting something he knows I don't—any one of them, more added depth to this dream.

My cock is out and because he's excited or simply doesn't want the moment and my body to possibly get away, he is sucking me. Was that so hard to say? It's just sex. Just the mechanics of arousal, the engineering of erotica. Cock A in mouth B. I've written it hundreds of times. But there's that difference again, like by writing it, putting it down on paper (or a computer screen) has turned diamond into glass, mahogany into plywood.

Cheapened. That's the word. But to repeat: I am a writer. It’s what I do. All the time. Even about love—especially about this kind of love.

He sucks my cock. Not like that, not that, not the way you're thinking: not porno sucking, not erotica sucking. This is connection, he to I. The speech of sex, blowjob as vocabulary.

I stay hard. What does this mean? It puzzles me, even in the fantasy. I have no doubts about my sexuality. I am straight. I write everything else, but I am a straight boy. I like girls. Men do not turn me on.

Yet, in my mind and in that little apartment, I am hard. Not "like a rock," not "as steel," not as a "telephone pole," but hard enough as his mouth, lips, and tongue—an echoing hard, wet and hard—work on me.

The answer is clear and sharp, because if I couldn't get hard and stay hard then he'd be hurt and the scene would shadow, chill, and things would be weighted between us. That's not the point of this dream, why I think about it.

So, onto sex. Nothing great or grand, nothing from every section of the menu. A simple action between two men who care about each other: he sucks my cock. He enjoys it and I love him enough to let him. That's all we do, because it's enough.

He sucks me for long minutes, making sweet sounds and I feel like crying. He puts his hand down his own pants, puts a hand around his own cock. For a moment I think about asking him if he wants help, for me to put my hand around him, help him jerk off. But I don't. Not because I don't want to, or because I'm disgusted, but because he seems to be enjoying himself so much, so delighted in the act of sucking me, that I don't want to break the spell, turn that couch back into a pumpkin.

He comes, a deep groan around my cock, humming me into near-giggles. He stops sucking as his gasps and sighs with release, looking up at me with wet-painted lips, eyes out of focus. I bend down and kiss him, not tasting anything but warm water.

I love him. I wanted to thank him. I hope, within this dream, I have. The night that didn't happen but could have.

For me, writing is just about everything: the joy of right word following right word all the way to the end. The ecstasy of elegant plot, the pleasure of flowing dialogue, the loveliness of perfect description. Sex is good, sex is wonderful, but story is fireworks in my brain. The reason I live. The greatest pleasure in my life.

And he has given me that, with nearly flowing letters on an agreement between his company and I, between his faith in my ability and myself. He looked at me, exposed on the page of a book, in the chapter of a novel, in the lines of a short story, and didn't laugh, didn't dismiss or reject. He read, nodded, smiled, and agreed to publish.

Sex cannot measure up to that. Bodies are bodies, but he has given me a pleasure beyond anything I'd felt: applause, and a chance to do much, much more with words, with stories.

He doesn't have a name, this man in my fantasy. There have been a lot of them over the years, and a lot more in the future, no doubt. Gay men who have touched me in ways no one has ever touched me before, by making love with my soul through their support of my writing. Each time they have, this fantasy has emerged from the back of my mind, a need to give them the gift they have given me: passion and kindness, support and caring, and pure affection.

I worry about this. I worry that they won't understand, take this secret dream of mine as being patronizing, diminishing them to nothing but a being with a cock who craved more cock. I've confessed a few times, telling a select few how I feel about them, how I wish I could do for them what they have done for me, to be able to put aside my heterosexuality for just an evening, an afternoon, and share total affection together.

Luckily, or maybe there really isn’t anything to worry about, the ones I've told, they smile, hold my hand, kiss my cheek, say the right thing and to this day, even right now, make me cry: "I wish we could too, but I understand. I love you too."

Am I bi? I know I'm physically not—I simply don't get aroused by men—but that doesn't mean I don't adore men, or for the ones I care about, the men who have touched my soul through their support and affection for my stories and writing, I wish I couldn't change. More than anything I wish I could give them what they have given me.

With a cock or a pen, with a story or hours of wonderful sex, it all comes down to one thing: love.

Painted Doll, An Excerpt (redux)

This is also ultra cool: The very nice Elisa just posted as excerpt from Painted Doll on her site (in addition to an excerpt from Dirty Words). Thanks so much, Elisa!

The View From Here: Songball

(the following is part of an ongoing 'column' I did for Suspect Thoughts, and, no, it's not supposed to make sense: only be weird fun)

The neighborhood kids are playing songball again. I don’t mind - except when that poor hydrocephalic kid from down at the Corporate Dormitories plays. His voice just grates on me -- and three times now he’s hit just the right frequency, causing my precious candyglass trinkets from that wonderful Summer at Bronze Beach to explode like kitsch-shrapnel hand grenades.

Last time I thought I’d escaped unscathed, that his screeching rendition of Baldwin’s new hit “Peacocks on my Mind” had somehow bypassed those mnemonic souvenirs of firm breasts and multicolored pubic hairs against a backdrop of pure, blue sands and a crashing champagne sea -- but after one drop, then two of blood on the manuscript pages I was laboring over, I reached up to find a sliver of cheaply spun crystal at the end of a wicked slice of skin.

I have to admit that when I heard their tunes drift up from the alley, I jerked my head to my little shelf of erotic brick-a-brack, waiting for one to detonate -- mentally running my apartment full of crap for something suitably heavy, but not too weighty, to drop on the poor little spud’s head.

Luckily for him and for my criminal record -- the Magistrates being tightly wound that Summer as the League of Handsome Prostitutes had decided to attend their Convention of Postures in unusual droves -- my kitsch stayed intact on my little shelf, the swollen-headed fry obviously having something better to do that screech and therefore inflict minor flesh wounds on lowly writers.

A writer lives for distractions. Anything will do. Messages suddenly crying to be composed, a stubborn pillow under the ass that cries to be fluffed and then fluffed again, a speck of grit on a window, a cup that simply looks out of place, a candletip that needs trimming, a fingernail just a shade too long -- or, in my case that afternoon, the local spawn playing songball in the alley.

I’m not a fan. Oh, sure, I like swingtag like most good Franciscans, but frankly I just don’t have the pitch or pipes to do anything but get teammates and adversaries to gag on their laughter or fall over backwards. So a lot of nuances of the game are lost on me.

But ... writers and their distractions, so I took my favorite cup, full of deepest black and wondered over to sip and stare -- anything but face that damned blank page.

Songball? Really? I had no idea what I was looking at. Oh, sure, I saw the alley, a battered couple of charcoal bins, a few flutters of litter, and the half-dozen or so scruffy (and sometimes not) local kids standing there on the soiled pavement, marked the usual cubic patterns of places and HOME, cheering, jeering, and chanting. I thought I knew the basics of the game, but either somehow I lost what little knowledge I’d had or the game had evolved on the street into something totally unique. The pitch was the same, that’s what I’d first heard, but the delivery, the spin, was strange and new.

I kept looking, listening, trying to figure out the play but just when I thought I had a grip on the rules, the behavior, it slipped away. Songs seemed to change and evolve totally at random as one child skipped forward and another skipped back. An outstanding performance -- like when a copper-headed sprite in Naval Greens belted out what I thought to be a perfect rendition of Carol’s “Death of Summer” -- brought catcalls and squeals of disappointment, and then when one of the little urchins tore up the air with what seemed to be just random squawks and squeals they got applause, cheers and to progress up five, and even seven squares

Fear started to niggle at the back of my mind, as if the world has suddenly twisted out of whack. Had I set down to my work in one world, with one version of songball only to look up somewhere else where the rules were completely different?

I thought about yelling down at the insufferable brats, either to get then to stop playing their game with my mind -- or at least key me in with the damned rules. I also thought about grabbing my shawl and rollers and just getting out of there -- maybe to the library where the books would hopefully still be books and the clerks as rude as ever.

I felt a shiver of panic, imaging a trip out my door -- down suddenly unfamiliar roads, past unfamiliar buildings, neighborhood commonalties having shifted into not-quite right, and what-the-hell? Would menus be nothing but puzzling heliographics and impenetrable encryptions? Would signs become a dance of squiggles and stylish ciphers? Was the city outside the city I remembered?

Just then, right when I was really starting to worry, one of my trinkets blasted away into a rainbow cascade of cheap materials -- and I knew, much to my satisfaction -- that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

"In The Butt, Bob!"

I'm thrilled to be the author of one of the few stories in Tristan Taormino's new book, The Anal Sex Position Guide, from Quiver Books. You can, naturally, order it from amazon.

Dark Roasted M.Christian (flashback)

Head over to Dark Roasted Blend for a article on the weird phenomena of mass hysteria:

For a topic involving laughter, what you’re about to read is not amusing. Creepy and disturbing, yes. Funny, no.

Things supposedly started innocently enough. Kashasha, near Lake Victoria in Tanzania in 1962: One girl in a boarding school there told another girl a joke. Maybe, “Have you heard the one about?” or “A Jew, an Indian, and Herbert Hoover walk into a bar …” or “Take my wife, please … ” Whatever the setup, the delivery, or punch line, the result was laughter. Whether it was a giggle, a guffaw, a chortle, a snort is irrelevant. The listener found it funny.

But then things went dark, weird, and creepy: one girl laughed, but then so did another, and then another, and then another, and then another.

After exposure, the incubation period from nothing to hysteria was short, from a few hours to a couple of days. There was no fever, no physical symptoms, just laughter and occasional crying between short moments of exhausted recuperation. When victims were restrained they sometimes became violent.

No one knew what to do. The school administrators were puzzled, local doctors were confused. Trying to put a lid on the phenomena, the administrators shut the school down.

But that was too little, too late: Whatever it was began to spread. It infected other schools and worked its way into the village, seemingly carried by infected students. It traveled to another village 20 miles away, and another 55 miles from Kashasha.

Even weirder, it wasn’t a constant thing. Like little hysterical explosions, the laughter would pop up, disable small groups for days at a time, then vanish.

Want to know what it was like? Well, it wasn’t funny, I can tell you that: one victim in Tanganyik reported watching it spread around him, hitting one neighbor after another: giggles, guffaws, chortles, snorts – horrible, nightmarish laughter. Terrified, he retreated into his home. But then he began to feel it too, a compulsion to join in with the hideous joke. He shouted and cried and – naturally -- laughed throughout the night.

The phenomena is called Mass Psychogenic Illness, more commonly known as mass hysteria, and although the Tanganyika Laughter Epidemic is an extreme version, it’s more common than you think. In fact what’s really scary about the giggling madness that sprung from one girl’s joke in Kashasha isn’t that it occurred but that many researchers believe it happens so often, and is so powerful, that we simply aren’t aware of it. Or rather we aren’t aware how much the phenomena controls us.

Ever hear the one about the Mad Gasser of Mattoon? In the 1930s -- all the way through to the mid 40s -- the residents of Botetourt County, Virginia, and Mattoon, Illinois, were terrorized by a surreal specter. Also called the “Anesthetic Prowler" or "The Phantom Anesthetist," he was supposedly a dark, mysterious figure responsible for dozens of victims falling ill from mysterious gasses flooding their homes. Whole families reported sudden attacks of choking, dizziness, headaches and various respiratory ailments.

The cops couldn’t catch him and doctors were baffled by the mysterious ailments of his victims. The FBI was called in but they couldn’t catch him either. Bulletins were circulated, newspapers warned residents to be on the lookout, vigilante groups roamed the streets trying to catch him -- in short, everyone went more than a little nuts trying to catch this gassy assailant.

But evidence suggests that he never existed. Sure, lots of people got sick, dozen and dozens and dozens more reported seeing dark and mysterious figures up to hideous no good stalking the night, and the authorities were run ragged with reports but there were no leads, nothing solid; nothing but suggestion, victims suffering from anxiety and fear, and the bizarre power of mass hysteria.

Ever hear the one about the Monkey Man of New Delhi? About four feet tall, sporting a metal cap and steel claws, he terrorized many a New Delhi night in 2001. Victims reported being savagely scratched and bitten by the odd ape. What’s worse is what happened to people scared of the ape: an unlucky short man was beaten by a mod who suspected him of being the ape, a pregnant woman fell down some stairs because neighbors had shouted that the ape had been seen, and others were said to have seriously injured themselves running away from what they thought was the ape.

The punch line for the Monkey Man is the same as for the laughing girls of Kashasha and the Mad Gasser of Mattoon: it was all in their minds.

You might guffaw and giggle about how silly those girls behaved, or how naive the folks of Mattoon were, or how ridiculous the Monkey Man sounds, but before you do too much laughing think about what some researches are hypothesizing: that much of what we believe about the world, about its horrors and mysteries -- including witch trials of every sort, communist conspiracies, UFOs, Satanic cults, white slavery, environmental illnesses, and so much more -- are nothing but signs of the tremendous power of the human mind, coupled with the drive to become one with the crowd.

Now ain’t that funny?

"And this is me waving back!"

Just wanted to toss a heartfelt thanks right back to the wonderful Nudemuse for her recent wave to me from her always-great blog:

... I also got another note from the ever lovely M.Christian (one of my serious favorite authors ever) and he is just wonderful. (HI! this is where you picture me waving madly at my monitor).

Dark Roasted M.Christian

Here we go again: another article for the always-great Dark Roasted Blend. This time it's about magnificent kinetic sculptures. Enjoy!



The word definitely gets tossed around way too much -- and too frivolously -- but even so, everyone pretty much agrees that Hemmingway was one, Einstein was one, Michelangelo was one, Frank Lloyd Wright was one, Freud was one ….

And then there’s Theo Jansen.

Without a doubt, with no hyperbole: Theo Jansen is an absolute genius.

You might not have heard of this particular Dutchman – unlike, say, others like Vermeer, Leeuwenhoek, or Huygens – but believe me, Theo Jansen deserves to be among their genius standing.

You see, Theo Jansen is an artist, but not just any artist. He doesn’t paint, doesn’t work in clay. Theo Jansen is a sculptor: he creates, from his own mind and imagination, intricate mechanisms. There have been other sculptors who've created work that moves – and there will be again – but what makes Theo’s work so amazing, so blindingly brilliant, is that his creations walk, stroll, stride, and amble. Yes, they walk.

Instead of being powered by primitive steam or modern electricity,
Theo’s creations are propelled by the air, by wind. They are strolling clipper ships, sauntering sailboats.

Just watch them -- they’re hypnotic, dreamy. Undulating beasts marching along the seaside, elaborate mechanisms walking through the surf spray ….

But Theo Jansen is not the only magnificently original artist out there doing things with gears and pulleys and wire and leverage. Many other artist/engineers are working on a wide range of ways to mix mechanical joints with organic precision to create devices that walk like living creatures -- though whether those creations are as whimsical as Jansen's is open to debate.

One truly spectacular group, lead by François Delarozière, is called La Machine. Uniting engineers – who know how to make things move –and artists – who have outrageous visions -- La Machine has created some truly awesome devices for some truly amazing events.



Recently, for instance, a 37-ton spider descended down the side of a building in Liverpool, in the United Kingdom. La Princesse, as she was called, proceeded through the city, her elegantly mechanical walk controlled by a team of skilled puppeteers. To say that the sight of this playfully nightmarish creature took the city by surprise is an understatement.

But the masterminds of La Machine have had other tricks up their wildly inventive sleeves, as well. In 2005, in public squares in cities all around the world, a massive Jules Verne inspired rocket ‘crashed’ to a landing. After a brief time a girl emerged from it. But this was not just any girl: she was a immense marionette controlled by dozens of skilled La Machine performers. Dreamlike, she walked – and even rode a scooter -- through city streets, taking in the adoration and amazement of the crowds.

But soon she was joined by an even greater kinetic marvel. Another elaborate puppet, the Sultan’s Elephant of La Machine, is an artistic and engineering marvel: a 50-ton imitation operated by more than 22 puppeteers. Watching the girl and the elephant … well, I’ve already called it ‘dreamlike.’ How about mesmerizing, incredible … or just unbelievably very cool?

Since we’re chatting about amazing mechanical/artistic creations, we have to mention the artist Frederick Roland Emett. Sure, you can point to Rube Goldberg, who certainly deserves praise, but Frederick Roland Emett has a leg up on Goldberg for his incredibly diverse work. Not only are his illustrations wild, fanciful, and outrageous but he also created many insanely elaborate sculptures and creations. Looking like Willy Wonka’s hallucinations, or Dr. Suess' nightmares, Emett’s sculptures have an entrancing craziness that’s dazzlingly hypnotic.



Creating something beautiful and wonderful takes one kind of skill, but to bring it to mechanical life – well, that takes genius.

Dirty Words, An Excerpt (redux)

This is ultra cool: The very nice Elisa just posted my excerpt from Dirty Words on her site. Thanks so much, Elisa!

Dark Roasted Science Fiction: Vacuum Flowers By Michael Swanwick and The Anubis Gates By Tim Powers

Here's another review of classic science fiction novels for Dark Roasted Blend:

There’s a lot of ways you could label Vacuum Flowers by Michael Swanwick: cyberpunk, post-cyberpunk, pre-transhuman, post-posthuman … and all those other silly labels pretentious science fiction reviewers and nit-picking analysts have been sticking on various books since the genre began to be taken -- or took itself -- too seriously.

But I have a better label for it. One I think says a lot more about this delightful book than any pre- or post- definition anyone could give it.

Sure, Vacuum Flowers does neatly fit into the cyberpunky domain (pre- or post- or whatever): set in an accessible where earth has been overrun by The Comprise, a voracious digital hive-mind, and the remaining free-will humans has escaped out into the solar system. The protagonist, Rebel Elizabeth Mudlark, begins the story like all good protagonists, as the subject of shadowy forces out to get something she possesses – and, naturally, what she isn’t exactly what she possesses.

But what makes Swanwick’s novel so wonderfully unique is that Rebel isn’t really Rebel. Originally a restless personality tester, someone who tries on artificial identities, she did the unthinkable and found a perfect one for her – Rebel’s – and stole it. See, in the post/pre (whatever) world of Vacuum Flowers personalities, memories, abilities, are as changeable as putting on, or taking off, make-up. In fact, Swanwick is credited by many as being one of the first creators of wetware, the idea of ‘painting on’ software to do just that.

And a lot of painting goes in Vacuum Flowers, but to Swanwick’s credit he takes this esoteric and possibly-confusing concept and makes it deceptively easy to understand, the book completely readable and totally enjoyable.

Just like the best of Alfred Bester, Swanwick is also deliciously and dazzling inventive, each page sparkling with memorable details and dazzling inventiveness: a blindly-focused quasi-communistic society dedicated to terraforming Mars, a renegade ‘mob boss’ who entertains himself by twisting the minds of his prisoner/guests, a multiple-personality ‘hero’ who has just the right mind for pretty much any job … Swanwick coolly and seductively brings the reader into Rebel’s kaleidoscopically fantastic, yet completely real-feeling world.

Yep, there are a lot of labels that could be tossed at Michael Swanwick’s Vacuum Flowers: post-this, post-that, transhuman, posthuman, cyberpunk ... whatever. The best label, though, and one that fits the novel so very well is one that every writer wants to get: A Really Good Book.

There’s a scene in The Anubis Gates that’s stayed with me ever since I first read it, some twenty or so years ago: our hero, Brendan Doyle, a professor at California State University Fullerton (one of my old alma maters, by the way), has found himself magically transported back to London in 1810.

Doyle, fascinated by a time he’s only read about, but also devastated that he’s trapped forever in the past, is walking through a street market when he hears someone whistling a tune, a song he suddenly realizes he knows.

The tune? “Yesterday” by the Beatles.

For me, that’s a special moment of brilliance in a novel packed full of all kinds of brilliances: a shivering little touch of perfect story-telling. One of the things I think is particularly excellent about the book is the way that Powers sort of restrains himself in his writing. Put it this way, if someone else were to write The Anubis Gates, especially these days, they’d have a tendency to make the book’s language too closely mirror the style and language of the time. But what Tim Powers does in The Anubis Gates is, instead, get to the basic – and fantastic – nature of a book from that time without resorting to overly-elaborate tricks.

The story-telling language in The Anubs Gates is the best kind of writing, smooth and seamless – infinitely readable and totally enjoyable.

But back to what makes The Anubis Gates so special. Like I said, what Powers has done is create an marvelously enjoyable book filled with the characters and details that feel like they’ve come from every Penny Dreadful and broadsheet from the 1800s: Horrabin, the nightmare clown and king of the London beggars; Jacky, the beggar who is actually the daughter of nobility on a quest for revenge; Amenophis Fikee, magician and leader of a gypsy clan cursed to become the body-thief Dog-Faced Joe, and so much more.

But The Anubis Gates is not just a playground for the author’s vivid imagination, for many real literary and historical celebrities also walk across the stage: Byron, publisher John Murray and many others. The world Powers creates – or just the past of the real world he plays in -- feels vivid, real, and always enjoyable.

In the end, the Anubis Gates remains a classically stylish and brightly imaginative novel told in a delightfully elegant way – an enjoyable read that feels timeless, which is quite an accomplishment for a book about time and travel.

Reminder #3

Logical-Lust is proud to announce the release of six special-edition short stories from the celebrated author M.Christian!

These six quick-read stories offer something about anything for anyone -- gay, straight, lesbian, BDSM ... you name it - including stories that have never been previously released or published!

"MOVING" - Straight BDSM erotica
In Sylvia’s dungeon, when you’re told not to move you’d better not ...
$2.00

"TWO MEN IN A BOAT/ON THE SCREEN" - Includes gay erotica
Two steamy tales, of two quite different types of passion!
$1.75

"HOLLYWOOD BOULEVARD" - Gay erotica
Sometimes meeting your big screen hero doesn’t end quite the way you wish ...
$2.00

"HACK WORK" - Speculative, futuristic, straight erotica
In the future, we may use others remotely for our own pleasures, but what of the one ‘taking the ride?’
$2.00

"SUNLIGHT" & "HER MASTER'S VOICE" - Includes gay and BDSM erotica
Another two scintillating tales of sensuality, both quite different.
$1.75

"A LIGHT MINUTE" - Lesbian erotica
Online, Sasha has breath-taking control over Alyx. How far will she take her?
$2.00

These special edition erotic stories are available as PDF, Mobipocket/Kindle/PDA, WORD, TEXT (with Microsoft Reader & HTML coming soon!).

M.Christian is an acknowledged master of erotica with more than 300 stories in such anthologies as Best American Erotica, Best Gay Erotica, Best Lesbian Erotica, Best Bisexual Erotica, Best Fetish Erotica, and many, many other anthologies, magazines, and Web sites. He is the editor of 20 anthologies including the Best S/M Erotica series, The Burning Pen, Guilty Pleasures, and others. He is the author of the collections Dirty Words, Speaking Parts, The Bachelor Machine, and Filthy; and the novels Running Dry, The Very Bloody Marys, Me2, Brushes, and Painted Doll.

M. Christian is the chameleon of modern erotica. One day punk, another romantic; one day straight, another totally perverse and polyamorous. But always sexy and and gripping.
- Maxim Jakubowksi, editor of the Mammoth Book of Erotica series

M. Christian is to erotica what Swarovski crystals are to Liberace: essential.
- Clint Catalyst, author of Cottonmouth Kisses

M. Christian's stories are the fairy tales whispered to one another by dark angels whose hearts and mouths are brimming with lust. He goes beyond the pale, ordinary definitions of sexuality and writes about need and desire in their purest forms. Readers daring enough to stray from the safety of the path will find in his images and words a garden of delights to tempt even the most demanding pleasure-seeker.
-- Michael Thomas Ford, Lambda Literary Award winner and editor

For more information check out:

Logical-Lust
M.Christian